Great pieces of music transport the audience on emotional journeys and tell stories through their melodies, harmonies, and rhythms. But can the information contained in a piece, as well as the piece’s effectiveness at communicating it, be quantified? Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have developed a framework, based on network theory, for carrying out these quantitative assessments. Analyzing a large body of work by Johan Sebastian Bach, they show that the framework could be used to categorize different kinds of compositions on the basis of their information content [1]. The analysis also allowed them to pinpoint certain features in music compositions that facilitate the communication of information to listeners. The researchers say that the framework could lead to new tools for the quantitative analysis of music and other forms of art.
To read more, click here.